Yesterday, for the first time in my life, I found myself on crutches. They’ll be with me for at least another week. Annoying, uncomfortable and inconvenient? Yes, but what an eye-opening day I had.
My colleagues were amazing. People got me coffee, brought lunch, wheeled me in an office chair, and even brought my car to the door. I am grateful. I am humbled. I am also much, much more aware of the intricacies of handicapped access. You really can’t appreciate the finer points until you are faced with the big door that opens inward, the trip to the men’s room, the frustration at having to plan your way around things you normally do without even thinking.
Also, a pleasant surprise. Some co-workers, passing in the hall as I clumped along, opened up and shared mobility stories of their own. The broken bone here, the troublesome knee there. The difficulty in learning to walk with crutches. Many in this group were people I don’t regularly work with, barely know, and usually just nod at in the halls. All of a sudden, we were chatting like old friends.
So, without getting all sentimental, it’s obvious that people really do want to connect. Is it about the crutches? Do people need to share trauma? Or are the crutches just a convenient entry point to conversation, a door through the social barrier? I don’t think a blog post can can do justice to these questions, but they’ll be on my mind for a while.
How did I get myself into this spot? A lawn sprinkler ambushed me, and I leaped away. Then I tried to leap in an orthogonal direction. Bad move. Go ahead, laugh; the medical staff did, and so did I.
